Movement on Fleet and M Door issues, plus a new dispute on the Piccadilly Line

Posted in Tubeworker's blog on ,

The dispute over the use of agency labour on LU Fleet has been resolved, with the company agreeing to take on the agency trainers on standard LU contracts, for periods of at least one year.

This is a significant victory against LU's drive to outsource. The principle of "sack the agencies, not the workers" has been won here, and hopefully the spirit of this dispute can be developed in other areas where the company has outsourced various aspects of the job. Getting agency trainers on Fleet taken back in house could be the first step towards blocking other attempts at outsourcing and getting other workers taken back in house too.

In the dispute over M Door operation on the Jubilee Line, RMT's Trains Health & Safety Council reps report that LU have agreed not to impose new procedures. The imposition of LU's new rule would have de-skilled the role of driver and helped pave the way for driverless trains. It's important that it's been staved off for now.

RMT is also making preparations to ballot Piccadilly Line drivers for strikes against authoritarian disciplinary practises, including the unfair sacking of driver Paul Okoro. Paul allegedly answered his phone while driving, even though the main evidence given against him, by a trainer who accompanied him in the cab, clearly stated "he did not answer his phone till he was in the [passenger] saloon”. (For more on Paul's case, see here.)

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